


seesaw.

by romulus_adhara



Category: Doctor Who, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Everybody Lives, M/M, This is confusing, Time Travel, and cute, day of the doctor au, eventually, harry is the doctor, i hope so, kind of?, louis is the master
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 05:45:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16510475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romulus_adhara/pseuds/romulus_adhara
Summary: Once upon a time, Doctor fell in love. It wasn’t sudden, and it wasn’t a surprise — his heart always belonged to the only person who could handle it.Once upon a time, Doctor broke a promise. It hurt him, even if it was the right thing to do. He turned away from the man who thought the world his playground. And well — Doctor got sick of the seesaw.





	seesaw.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kakogohuya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakogohuya/gifts).



> this is a birthday gift for katya because she's a legend and deserves it

It gets lonely.

He puts his hands on the console and closes his eyes. TARDIS always knows what he needs, always guides him to whatever constellation calls, whatever planet is desperate for his help, whatever person is praying for salvation. Today, she’s silent. The engines aren’t whirring to life. She shows him something, though.

A distant memory of a boy with eyes as blue as the waterfalls of that little place he visited as a child on the Umbeka, where spring always lasted just for a few weeks.

Seeing his smile still hurts. Hearing his screams still makes him want to curl up on the floor and weep for forgiveness. He let him die so that the rest of humanity could be spared. He flew away with a single thought — that he would’ve gladly given all their lives to save him.

Harry shudders. Will he ever stop regretting sacrificing Master? Can any being, Time Lord or otherwise, not long for the other half of their soul that was ripped away and plunged into darkness? He was everything — his best friend, his sworn brother, his first and only love. His laugh is the one thing that always comes to Harry in his dreams.

Does it make him a selfish man? Having lost everything, his planet and his race, his entire family and brotherhood, but among all them, missing Master the most? He did the selfless thing. He’d have preferred to die with him.

The vision changes. The lingering image of Master’s laughing face, his eyes crinkled up and bright, still stays on his eyelids, yet now TARDIS is showing him Earth. Somewhere in Britain, he supposes, if misty green fields and the chilly air he feels on the back of his neck are anything to go by. He hears laughter, and at first, it sounds so familiar both his hearts skip a beat, yet he realizes instantly that’ it’s not Him. It’s a boy, young and full of life, playing with a little girl on the ground. He can’t tell what they’re saying, but it’s evident that they are happy. He doesn’t see the boy’s face at first, but then he turns around to where the projection of Harry is standing, and he wants to scream. His eyes are the same shade of blue, if not brighter. Master’s eyes were filled with anger and determination; this boy’s gaze reminds Harry about being young and reckless.

“Come on, Félicité,” the boy says to the little girl. “Mom is calling us for dinner.”

The girl sprints to her feet yet waits for her brother to get up. He makes a show of it for her amusement, pretending as if his limbs are tired and cranky, and the girl laughs, the soft bells of her happiness chiming in the wind.

“Ugh, I’m too old for this,” he complains but as soon as he’s standing up the pretend tiredness is gone and he’s crouching as if preparing to run. “Race you to the house?”

Félicité gasps and starts running away, her long brown hair like a swimming strip in the air. The boy doesn’t go after her right away. He looks around at the landscape and sighs.

Harry looks closely. His face is beautiful but there is some undeniable sadness that paints his features with exhaustion. He looks right at Harry, and for some moment, he thinks the boy can see him. The time stops, and Harry sees a mystery in the blue eyes. Why is he sad? His lips are made for laughter yet they’re pursed now. The boy looks like he wants to run yet there’s not enough space on Earth to allow him to truly feel the freedom.

He sighs and goes after his sister. Harry follows him with his gaze and smiles softly.

The vision disappears, and he opens his eyes. The console is lit up as if it’s ready for him to guide it. He puts his fingers on the handle. Looks at the rose ring.

“Just wait for me,” Harry whispers and pulls the switch.

TARDIS whirs to life and lights up with golden colors. He feels the stars disappearing as he enters the vortex.

_Just wait for me._

They move across galaxies and timelines, and Harry feels the excitement growing inside him. He hasn’t been to Earth in so long. It seems like the time has come to pay the Third planet a visit.

/

Harry remembers wanting to fix the brakes as he kicks open the door and climbs out of the overturned TARDIS into what appears to be a chicken shed. The smell is telling, and the loud noise that birds are making makes him giggle like a kid. He loves Earth, damn.

He looks around to make sure he didn’t grill some poor unsuspecting chicken and nods to himself. No victims, and the straw thrown around just slightly smolders, so he’s good.

“What the hell?”

He whips around just to be faced with an angry face that is already familiar to him. The boy from the vision stands before him in his pajamas, his hair a tangled mess, and his exceptionally blue eyes burning with annoyance.

“Hi,” Harry breathes out and wiggles his fingers in greeting. “Oops?”

“ _Oops_?” The boy screeches incredulously. He’s got a high voice, Harry thinks. “You scared me chickens!”

“Well, your chickens scared me!” Harry retaliates before realizing how ridiculous it sounds. He giggles again and puts his hands together, tilting his head slightly.

The boy huffs out a breath and crosses his hands on his chest, his brow arched expectantly.

“Well?”

“Well?” Harry repeats, his lips parted slightly.

The boy throws his hands in the air and Harry flinches, expecting another attack of high-pitched swears.

“Who the fuck are you, and what are you doing in my chicken shed?” Comes as expected, and Harry frowns.

“That’s— all you want to know?” He gestures to the giant blue police box behind him.

“Well, duh,” the boy scoffs.

“Okay.” Harry swallows. “I’m the Doctor, but you can call me Harry.”

“I will call you Asshole, but you may proceed,” the boy huffs out and purses his lips. It’s adorable. There’s a feather in his hair. Harry’s itching to take it away, but there’s a possibility his hand will get bitten, so he resists the urge.

“About your second question.” Harry squints and opens and closes his mouth a couple of times. His usual approach would be to spur out the same old tale about getting lost in time while using as many weird terms as he can, but once again, the boy looks like he won’t hesitate to smack Harry, so he sighs. “The brakes in my ship are horrendous, to be honest.”

The boy’s eyebrows are still so high they’re almost halfway up his forehead. He leans to the side to look behind Harry.

“That’s too small to be a ship,” he deadpans.

“Wait till you’re inside it,” Harry snickers, rubbing his hands.

“I’m not getting inside your box, you pervert,” the boy shouts out disbelievingly. “Get it out of my property, or I’m calling the cops.”

“Yeah, about that.” Harry bites his lip. “Can I hang around for a bit?”

The boy sputters and goes white.

“What?! No!”

“But I wanted a cup of tea.” Harry pouts.

It never goes like this. He suddenly can’t remember how he always invites his companions along, but something tells him that none of the usual approaches will work with this boy.

“Oh, you wanted tea,” the boy says, compassion so fake it almost makes Harry laugh. “Poor soul. Get the fuck out.”

Harry goes to say something else, but suddenly there’s a loud bang, and he turns around to see the door to TARDIS agape like it was thrown open.

“What—” The boy drops his act and comes closer, looking inside.

Harry waits patiently for him to stick his head inside the ship and look around, yet the expected gasp never comes. He turns around to see the boy’s face serious and collected as he’s observing the insides of the box that cannot physically fit in this tiny space. Finally, he turns to Harry, his brow arched in an already-familiar manner.

“It’s bigger on the inside.”

Now, that’s familiar. Harry smiles wide and goes to say something, but his hopefully future companion beats him to it.

“Compensating?”

Harry sputters at the shit-eating smirk on the boy’s lips. His eyes crinkle up, and it’s so familiar around the blue eyes that it feels like a punch to the gut.

“I’ll have you know, you brat—” he starts, his voice breaking.

“That’s not polite for someone breaking into my chicken shed.” The boy shrugs and smiles again. “But you’ve got me intrigued.”

Harry opens his mouth, lost for words. The boy rolls his eyes and touches Harry’s chin to snap it shut.

“The chicken will flow in.”

He goes to the exit, leaving Harry dumbfounded, but at the last moment, he turns around.

“You coming?” He asks as if he wasn’t trying to kick Harry out mere minutes ago. “That tea won’t make itself. I’m Louis, by the way.”

At that, he comes out, and Harry can’t help but giggle. He snaps his fingers to close the door to TARDIS and pats her wall.

“Thanks, Sexy,” he whispers and patters after Louis, his previous excitement growing even more so.

This is promising to be a very good trip.

/

“So what’s the deal with your box?” Louis asks as soon as they’re inside the small kitchen. Harry can see the details showing that there are children living in this house everywhere — small toys thrown around, a giant empty box that at some point contained an unnamed amount of juice boxes. It’s quiet now, and he doesn’t feel anyone else in the house. It’s curious.

“It helps me get around.” Harry shrugs and smiles smugly. Louis snorts.

“What, you just fall onto people’s chicken sheds and ask them to feed you?”

“No, generally I land more...” Harry pauses to choose a word that describes his TARDIS in more of a pleasant light. “Gracefully.”

“I see,” the boy hums. He’s fixing Harry a cuppa in what looks like a green kiddy mug with a big ugly gnome instead of a handle. It looks handmade. By a very lazy child. Harry tries not to get offended. “How does it work?”

“Magic.” Harry pokes his tongue out and snickers.

“Ha-ha, because you’re like Harry Potter, I get it.” Louis rolls his eyes and hands Harry his tea. Harry tries not to flinch at the obnoxiously ugly mug. In hindsight, he actually kinda likes it.

“Potter?” Harry frowns, racking his brains. The name seems distantly familiar, yet he doesn’t recall ever meeting them. Huh. An oversight on his part. Maybe, it’s the first trip he can take Louis on!

“You’re shitting me.” Louis stares at him, incredulous. “You haven’t read Harry Potter?”

“Uhm, no?” It’s the correct answer yet Harry is still afraid he will get slapped for it, so he wraps his fingers around the mug and takes a sip. The tea is horrendous. He adores it.

“Incredible,” Louis scoffs and leans back on the kitchen counter, his arms crossed on his chest.

His tone, his voice, his mannerism — with every passing moment, he reminds Harry more and more of Master, and when it should scare him and make him wary, it does exactly the opposite. Harry is positively excited. His fingers itch to reach out and touch Louis’ skin to check if it’s the same texture as the one he once caressed with so much love. He traces Louis’ features with his eyes. The resemblance is uncanny, and he wonders how he didn’t notice it right away. It’s like Louis is Master’s younger human brother, and while Harry knows it’s impossible, it still sends a thrill of anticipation down his spine.

“You married?” Louis wonders all of a sudden, his eyes focused on Harry’s hands.

 _I’m a widower_.

“No,” Harry tells him a half-truth. “You’re interested?”

“Hold your horses, cowboy.” Louis rolls his eyes and nervously shrugs his shoulders. “You have many rings, that’s all.”

Harry looks down at his hands. Most of the time, he forgets they’re even there. He wears them every regeneration, just to remind every version of himself where they came from. And okay, he also hopes to once regenerate as a female, how exciting that would be! He tried to grow his hair out once to match up a little, but it had to go after an unfortunate encounter with an angry race of hereditary hairdressers. Well, they weren’t angry when he got there, but they  _did_ get very pissed at him for stealing their divine comb. In Harry’s defense, he didn’t know they were worshipping it. In any case, his hair is an average length now, and Louis is staring at his hands.

“They’re all gifts.” He shrugs, frowning. The rose ring is his favorite, and the last one he ever got from Master. “Haven’t updated the collection in quite a long time, to be completely honest.”

He tries to mask his sadness with another sip of his terrible tea (that he is completely in love with), but those damn blue eyes seem to see through him. Remarkable, how even after six centuries, he can still get affected by them.

“They died?” Louis tilts his head, his lips pursed in a sad curve. “I’m sorry, mate.”

“It’s been a long time.” Harry sniffs and looks away. “About six hundred and forty years, I reckon.”

He expects Louis to snort and argue with him, but there’s silence. He looks back at the strange boy and sees him studying Harry’s face intently.

“You’re old,” he finally breathes out with a cheeky grin. “Must be my record. The oldest guy I ever had at my house at night was thirty-two.”

He laughs at the memory, and Harry can’t help the grin that stretches out his lips. He’s following the movement of Louis tiny body with his gaze, hungry for every little change in his stance, the crinkling of his eyes, the sharp tips of his teeth that can be seen now that he’s smiling, the happiness, unabashed, pure, that seems to radiate from him now. He’s bright like a sun, and Harry could not possibly look away. He’s been to hundreds of stars and constellations, seen the suns dying and come to life, and he’s seen the most beloved soul of his go to waste, yet nothing had shone as bright as Louis does. It is positively fascinating.

“I wonder what you were doing with that man,” he asks distractedly, trying to calm his racing mind. If before he came here out of curiosity, then now he feels like it is vital for him to leave only with Louis by his side.

“Oh,” Louis breathes out, looking at Harry mischievously. “You know.”

He wiggles his eyebrows, and Harry sputters on his tea. Right. He forgot how overtly sexual humans can get. He doesn’t mind it, it just can be surprising at times. Time Lords always treated sex as the means to procreate, rarely engaging in any intimate activities simply for the fun of it. Master was different, of course, and Harry can recall a few particularly interesting meeting they have had with that activity in mind. He feels the grin on his lips.

“Pervert.” He rolls his eyes. “Do you like to travel?”

The change in the course of their conversation is so abrupt that Louis sputters and chuckles nervously.

“I never get to.” He shrugs, unsure. “Me mum always works, so the wee ones are on me. I’m okay with that!” He rushes to clarify even though Harry didn’t even think to doubt it. “I rarely get the house all to myself, like today, let alone get to go away for even a few days.”

“But do you wish to?” Harry wonders quietly, hiding his grin behind his green mug.

(He can see Louis’ eyes focused on his, probably noting the similarities between their color and the color of the mug, and Harry notes his irises widen, just a bit. He thinks about Master. His irises were always blown, his mind always excited and agitated about the world around him, interested in what would happen if he did something mad to the point Harry had to do the unthinkable to stop him. It hurts.)

“Of course.” Louis chuckles shyly, looking at his hands. “Who doesn’t?”

“Well.” Harry pouts as if he’s thinking. “I personally know a bloke who hasn’t moved from his bed since, like...” He looks at his watch. “Four hundred seventy-two years ago. Precisely, actually, huh.”

Louis lets out a laugh, and right there and then Harry decides that it is one of his most favorite sounds in the universe. He follows Louis’ light, mesmerized by how comfortable it is — to be enchanted by this boy.

“I’m not that lazy,” Louis says, still laughing a little. “And I don’t think I could sit still for an hour, let alone centuries.”

Harry smiles, but he’s still unable to hold back a frown.

“You believe me, then.” He tilts his head. They’re somehow standing pretty close, and he notes that Louis’ eyes also have little pools in them. Fascinating. The same exact pattern. “About my age.”

“Lad, you have a giant box that could probably fit my entire house inside,” Louis snorts. “I think I can go with the whole ‘looks like a model but have probably seen the first King’ thing.”

“Several of your houses, actually,” Harry corrects him but jumps right to another part of his sentence: “You think I look like a model? I haven’t looked in a mirror for about thirteen years.”

Louis opens his mouth as if to say something, but then changes his mind and rolls his eyes, scoffing.

“Now you’re just fishing for compliments,” he notes.

Harry contemplates pouting but then thinks better of it.

“So,” he starts, the excitement already putting a smile on his face and a spring to his step. “You wanna travel with me?”

“Where?” Louis immediately asks, and Harry looks for skepticism on his face, wary, yet there’s only genuine interest.

He grins, covering his smile with his mug.

“Well, anywhere in the universe and beyond, of course.”

/

“This is  _sick_ , mate,” Louis exclaims in wonder as he’s studying the console while Harry checks if chickens made any damage to his baby. Unlikely, of course, but he’s always wondered if there’s something that can penetrate TARDIS’s shields. What if it’s Earth chickens?! You never know.

Harry looks up and smiles as he watches the boy fill the space around him with energy. It is fascinating how much alike he is to Master. Harry thinks that with every passing second he sees it more clearly. Is he projecting? His longing, loneliness, and love for the man who made him see the true worth of stars, onto this boy, barely twenty-one, looking around him in awe.

It’s probably the eyes. Yes, that’s what it is. His blue eyes, looking at Harry with familiar wonder and mischief, yet missing the haunting, possessed look. Harry doesn’t know whether he likes it more this way. Everything about Master was, and will forever remain, the mystery in his hearts.

“Have you gathered your things?” Harry asks when he’s satisfied with the results of his inspection.

“Yeah, I threw them there.” Louis makes a vague motion with his hand, pointing to somewhere below the console, his eyes still fixed on the genius interior of the ship. Harry chuckles. “Your design is horrific, to be honest.”

Harry gasps, pressing his hand to one of his hearts.

“How dare you!”

Louis looks at him, his eyes crinkling at the edges, and Harry has to bite his tongue not to say something stupid and complementary. It is quite ordinary for him to say the truth, but humans tend to get overwhelmed and take his observations as compliments or, worse!, flirting.

“So are we going?” Louis asks, jumping onto the console next to Harry, and he wonders at how the boy is so loud and all over the place yet manages to fit into a little space between the tumblers. “Oh wait, we’re not!”

Harry opens his mouth to ask, but before he can make a sound, Louis is already out the door, leaving Harry to gape after him. That was probably the shortest trip he’s had since...

He can’t finish the thought because there’s a sudden peck on his leg and he looks down, appalled, just to find an enormous white chicken feeding on his pants.

“Ah, what a beauty you are!” He exclaims just as the creature decides that it does not like Harry, after all, and starts pecking at his sneaker. “Alright, that’s quite enough!”

He takes the chicken into his hands just as Louis returns, another bag in his arms.

“What is that?” Harry asks as the chicken starts pecking away at the flower on his jacket. The poor thing doesn’t realize it’s the design. Huh. One to Doctor, zero to chicken!

“Some bedtime reading,” Louis answers, opening the bag and throwing a book at Harry. He manages to catch it with one hand. “Are you stealing my chickens?”

“This one came to me.” Harry shrugs as he takes in the title of the book. _Har_ _ry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone_. “Oh! Brilliant!”

Louis laughs and tilts his head.

“So are you giving me back my chicken?”

“She’s my friend now!” Harry announces, putting the book on the console and petting the animal in his hands. It’s still somewhat unamused that it can’t feed off his jacket.

“Right.” Louis looks at him suspiciously, but then shrugs and closes the door behind him. “But we’ll call it Zayn, after an old friend of mine.”

“Sure, I love that.” Harry grins and lowers the animal on the floor, hoping that TARDIS will provide it with food and everything it needs. It must be a nightmare to try and clean out the chicken manure out of the carpet so he hopes the animal doesn’t wander off to the lodge.

“So now, are we going?” Louis asks, hopping on the console again. He looks around him, mindful of where exactly he’s sitting. “I won’t break the time with me buttocks, will I?”

“Not if you sit still,” Harry placates him even though it seems unlikely for Louis to do exactly that. “Where do you want to go?”

This makes Louis close his mouth and frown. Harry can physically see all the possibilities and thoughts swirling inside his mind, and it is positively fascinating, to gaze upon such a young yet powerful mind, thriving with life and every. He is becoming addicted to this — to how alike it feels to have Louis by his side to how it felt running with the Master. He feels longing, and, perhaps, guilt. Is he replacing his love? Is he projecting? Is he being unfair to both Master’s memory and Louis? Ah, all the questions, and not a single answer in sight!

“Surprise me,” Louis finally says. “Show me something great. Make me believe you’re not just a whack job with a huge blue box.”

“Oh,” Harry gasps theatrically. “But I am exactly that!”

He smiles and turns to the console once again, thinking for a few moments before putting in the coordinates.

“Hold tight,” he warns and pulls the lever.

The last thing he hears before they enter the vortex is bright laughter, the one so familiar, like a reminder from the grave — _he_ shall always carry on. It is simply Louis, of course, yet as Harry looks at him across the console as TARDIS is flying and shaking, he thinks about his eyes. About his piercing blue eyes.

/

Harry expected a lot from Louis. Galaxies, time periods, historical events, famous figures, unknown stars; but Louis asks him to take him back to Earth.

It’s five years in the past, and they’re back in Doncaster. Harry follows a girl running past him with his gaze, excited to witness such a carefree soul, her life being so bright and colorful, but this moment — running and being free and laughing with her friends, being its highlight. She’s as free and young as he once was, and she is just a human child, in his life just for a second, and then away she goes.

He’s so immersed in observing her retreating form that he doesn’t notice Louis isn’t beside him anymore. He’s searching the crowd, noticing how many children and teenagers there are. It looks like some kind of a human fair, and he takes a step into the crowd, eager to learn what’s the commotion is about. People are shouting and laughing, exchanging news and anecdotes, and ah! This is why he loves Earth — they are all so alive, so full of hope and light!

“Don’t wander around, I don’t wanna get stuck here,” comes a voice, and he turns around, a smile already on his lips as he faces Louis once again.

But Louis’ face is sad, and Harry can’t help but take a step forward and put his hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” He asks quietly, trying not to pry too much. “What is happening?”

Louis clears his throat and starts walking, leading them through the crowd and to a tracking field. Some children are stretching on the other side of it, and Harry notices a familiar face. Something starts clicking into place.

“My sister, Félicité.” Louis swallows and hugs himself. “She won first place today. Or well, will win.”

“Ah,” Harry murmurs. “A good moment to relive, I agree. We should be careful as not to meet you from the past.”

“We won’t.” Louis frowns and looks down, his lips trembling. “I missed it. Got so tired on the night shift that overslept. I got here when she was already receiving her prize. Lied to her that I saw her run.”

Harry stays silent, unsure as to how to proceed. Human emotions are a peculiar thing that he could never really master, only grasping the basics; and every time he thought he’s succeeded, they found a way to surprise him.

“She said she felt me watching and cheering her on,” Louis confesses. “I still feel like shit.”

“But she... She wouldn’t be mad at you?” Harry tries, trying to remember everything Louis has told him. “You were working to help your family out.”

“I should’ve been here.” Louis’ voice is hard. Harry frowns. Fascinating.

“And now you are,” he says quietly.

Louis doesn’t say anything, just nods, hugging himself.

The girls are getting ready to run, and Harry looks at Louis’ profile and watches a smile appear on his lips, his pride for his sister evident in his eyes. It makes him remember something.

_Master is fast, faster than Doctor could ever be, yet he falls back when he notices the other boy falling behind._

_“Come on, you!” He shouts, running backward and smiling. His smile is beautiful. Doctor thinks it can be dangerous._

_They finally reach their destination, and he bends down, putting his hands on his knees to catch his breath. They’re standing near the cliff, and when he finally stands up, he feels his breath hitch again but this time not because he got tired._

_It’s so beautiful that he cannot find the words in any language he knows to describe it. The land stretches out before them for miles and miles, green and yellow and red and blue plants covering everything he can see. Two suns are almost set, and they give nature the red glint that makes it even more mesmerizing._

_“One day it shall be ours,” Master says, his voice full of pride and glee. “Everything in this universe shall be ours, my love.”_

_Doctor turns to look at him, his profile illuminated by one of the suns, his eyes glowing blue such a bright shade that they look like sapphires. He’s scared. Doctor is scared. Master turns to him, and his hands are cold when they touch Doctor’s cheek._

_“Do we really need it all?” He wonders, his voice trembling._

_Master doesn’t answer. His kisses are always gentle, but this time it’s hard and determined, his lips pressing firmly._

_“Promise to always be by my side,” he pleads, yet it doesn’t sound like a request. It sounds like a demand. “Without you,” he whispers, his lips against Doctor’s. “The Universe will never be enough.”_

_Doctor feels how strong he is, and he sees the madness in his irises, his delusions in the crinkles by his eyes. And he takes his hands and whispers back, “I promise.”_

He broke his promise, of course. He had to. He didn’t have any other choice.

Louis shouts from beside him, and Harry blinks, feeling wetness on his eyelashes. The girls, it seems, are finishing the track, and he swallows, focusing on little Félicité. She’s almost flying, her form graceful as she’s beating her competitors and going for the win. Louis is screaming so loudly it’s a wonder she doesn’t get distracted, but Harry notices a smile on her lips. Maybe, she does hear him.

“Look at her, she’s amazing!” Louis shouts, his lips stretched out in the happiest of smiles, his laughter ringing over the crowd.

“I’m looking,” Harry murmurs, mesmerized by the picture of pure glee that is this boy’s face. His eyes are shining, following every movement of his sibling, his hands clenched as if he doesn’t know already that she is going to win.

He could’ve picked anything — any date and place; yet he chose for his first travel this day — his little sister’s big win that he missed. Nobody knew but him yet he still wanted to come. Harry feels his breath being taken away.

/

They have to leave when they notice a younger version of Louis run up to the crowd from another side. The door slams shut after them as they fall in, breathless from trying to get away fast enough so that even their blurry faces are unrecognizable.

They fall on the floor, laughing, and Harry feels elevated. Nothing compares to this — a simple feeling of being united in pure, free glee.

Louis falls silent after a while and Harry feels him turning his head. “Thank you,” he whispers, his voice raspy. “It was a perfect first trip.”

Harry presses his lips in a smile, turning his face to meet Louis’ eyes. He’s starting to learn  _the differences_ even if the similarities are too striking for him to stay sane. It’s harder than he thought — looking at the face of not-his-dead-lover and trying to remember that there is a living breathing boy behind it all.

“It was only a first,” he says softly, stroking his rose ring. “There are so much more to come. If you wish.”

Louis doesn’t answer right away, causing Harry to hold his breath. He is used to losing companions — either to death or their Earth responsibilities, but it’s never been so far; and he never felt such a strong desire to hold someone back. Louis blinks, and Harry watches him as if in slow motion.

_“Have you ever thought about running away?” Master asks, his fingers poking at a hole in his robe. “Like, forever?”_

_Doctor rolls around from where he was staring at the sky, thinking about its familiar color, and frowns._

_“Where will we go?”_

_They’re barely seventy, virtually children, but they already know they’ll never leave each other’s side. Doctor — because he knows Master needs to be looked after; Master — because he finally found someone to look at him and see him._

_“Anywhere.” He jerks his shoulder, refusing to meet Doctor’s eyes. He flinches, his fingers flying to his head. “This fucking song.”_

_Doctor sits up, scooting closer and putting his forehead on Master’s, as if trying to hear those sounds that’s been driving him insane for so long. He never hears them, but he always tries so hard — to hear, and understand, and help._

_“I guess I don’t mind running away,” he murmurs, his fingers finding Master’s. “If it helps you.”_

_“Ah, my darling.” Master chuckles, and his blue blue blue eyes look so much older than he is. “But you should never do anything for someone else. Promise me you will always look out just for yourself.”_

_He wants to argue. He wants to tell him all the reasons why it’s wrong to think like that. Live like that. Love like that. He stays silent._

_“I promise.”_

He broke that one, too.

“I do.” Harry looks up to see Louis smiling brightly. “I wish. Let’s go wreck some shit, eh? You choose this one.”

He shoots up, his slim form looking so in place here that Harry feels weak. He stands up, too, watching on as Louis dances around, humming something to himself.

“Do you have a sound system or something?” He frowns, looking at the console as if the requested thing should appear right there and now.

“Little to your left.” Harry points to one of the screens and smiles at Louis screaming out in delight.

“Wonderful!” He leans over the keyboard, his fingers over it. “Now, what shall we play?”

He thinks for a few seconds and then smiles wickedly. Presses a few buttons, and a familiar soft pop sound starts coming from the speakers all over the bridge.

“Do you know BTS?” Louis wiggles his eyebrows, and Harry frowns, feeling that he’s missing something.

“Yes, actually,” he answers honestly. “Taehyung is a wonderful man.”

Louis’ eyes widen as Suga’s voice starts singing softly.

“I’m so jealous right now,” he whispers but recovers quickly. “Anyway, dance with me, grandpa.”

He doesn’t even give Harry time to react — just grabs his hands and starts swinging them, twisting his body in ridiculous moves. Harry laughs loudly, and it’s so light that he feels like he’s flying again. He joins in, moving his feet in bizarre zags, mindful of Zayn the Chicken that came out, attracted by the sound.

He looks at Louis’ happy carefree face and thinks — _Never stop smiling_.

_The beginning was quite fun_

_Just with all the ups and downs_

_But suddenly, we’re tired_

_From a waste of meaningless emotions_

They end up going into the future. Three hundred years, a planet that looks entirely like a maximized version of Disneyland, and there’s a giant bloody Mickey Mouse chasing after them, Minnie’s ears in his hand used as the throwing weapon.

“You promised me it’ll be fun!” Louis screams as they hide on two opposite sides of a huge seesaw. It’s constructed in a way that hides them both from the sight of that bloodlust mouse.

“Well, isn’t it?!” Harry screams back, risking it and poking his head out to evaluate the threat. Half the park is destroyed, and whoever made the native turn against the visitors is nowhere to be seen. Someone had to do it, right?

“Hey, who even made this planet?” Louis shouts from the other side, ducking just in time to escape the pink flaming bolt flying past him. “I mean, it’s obviously human-made, right? After the park on Earth?”

“No, actually,” Harry clarifies, his eyes searching the surface, and finally he finds what he’s looking for. Ah! Yes, exactly! He turns to Louis. “Long story short, I once accidentally kidnapped a guy and brought him here. Erased his memories after, of course, but I guess something stuck, so err— Well, he kind of built a similar thing when he came back home.”

He looks at Louis expectantly while the realization sinks in. Harry presses his lips together and makes an innocent face.

“ _You kidnapped Walt Disney_?!” He screeches, and suddenly, the Mickey notices him and starts moving towards the seesaw.

Harry screams out in frustration and points his sonic screwdriver towards a giant still form of a dog, bringing the mechanism to life.

“In my defense, he hid in my ship!” He rolls his eyes as he’s programming the robot to go after its master. “I think he had a crush on me.”

He thinks he hears Louis murmur something that sounds like “who wouldn’t”, but right at this moment, Goofy barks and starts attacking the Mickey, erupting sounds of screeching metal all around them. They watch in awe how two robots struggle to defeat one another, but Harry didn’t graduate his programming class with honors for no reason _(he was second, of course, because Master was always the first — and it felt like an honour to be next to him on every list)_. Goofy makes a finishing move with his tail and brings Mickey to the ground, stomping on his head with his feet, causing damage to the main mechanism. Mickey lets out his last breath, air leaving him with a whistling sound (robots who breath — the evolution of this planet is truly remarkable), but something happens before he still completely — he lets go of a round ear of Minnie’s he’s been using as a weapon, and Harry watches on in dread how a fifty feet metal part is rolling towards the seesaw — the end where Louis is standing, frozen in his place.

Harry doesn’t think about it — he runs, runs like it’s his last time, like he’s trying to catch up to the boy who’s always been faster than him, like he’s sprinting up the hill to see the friend he adores, like he’s flying across the field to prevent the man he loves from turning into his enemy. He didn’t make it there in time that last time — but now he does, and he jumps on Louis, getting him away and falling on the ground just as the ear rolls past them, barely missing.

Harry pants, relaxing his body and groaning. There’s something soft and nice-smelling under his face. It’s pleasant.

“It’s not like I don’t occasionally enjoy an attractive man on top of me, but I still think we haven’t reached that level in our relationship.” It’s grumpy and sassy, but there are hands on Harry’s back, holding him in place.

“Sorry,” he mumbles into Louis’ chest. There’s a fire starting behind them, and Goofy lets out a howling sound.

“We need to get out before the other locals get here,” Louis suggests.

Harry raises his head, putting his chin on Louis’ collarbone and smiling.

“No. We need to find out who hacked Mickey.” He licks his lips, his mind racing. “The natives are very pleasant and gentle people. Well. Robots.” He frowns and looks closely into Louis’ eyes. It helps him focus. “When we arrived, there wasn’t anybody here, just a crazy Mouse and a Goofy. Who was turned off.”

Louis gets up on his elbows, looking down at Harry and frowning.

“What are you saying? Someone was expecting us?” He looks around, suddenly suspicious that there’s someone hiding in the bushes or behind the attractions. Harry chuckles and bites his lip.

“Someone might have been expecting _me_ ,” he says slowly.

“Well, as much as you’re enjoying using me as a pillow,” Louis says, his voice gaining that shade that Harry calls ‘I’m about to be a sassy bitch, and you’re gonna be okay with it’. Harry smiles softly. “My arse is sore, and not in a good way, nobody is obviously coming to check on the mess, and while you’re cute when you’re thinking, I feel we need to scatter.”

“Why?” Harry asks. Something feels strange.

Louis opens and closes his mouth, and then sighs in exasperation, hitting his palms on the ground.

“I don’t know.” He says, his shoulders shaking nervously. “I just feel it.”

Harry stands up, then, suddenly feeling something cold and distant inside of him. He looks at Louis, noticing the blue of his eyes for what must be a thousandth time, and swallows.

“I think you’re right,” he says quietly, his fingers gripping the sonic screwdriver. “Let’s scatter.”

It takes them ten minutes to find TARDIS and get inside, Louis sending her flying into the void like Harry had taught him. That same song he played after their first journey is softly coming through the speakers, and Harry looks at Louis, feeling as if he’s missing something.

_"It worked."_

_Doctor is gasping for air, unable to look up from where he's pressing his forehead to his husband's chest. No. It can't end like this. The War is not over. They are not over._

_“Promise me,” Master whispers, his last breaths being torn out of him, his hands gripping Doctor’s palms. “Promise you will never forget me.”_

_The pain isn’t something he will later be able to describe — it’s not physical, but it feels like every part of his body is on fire. Master puts Doctor’s palm on his chest, where one of his hearts is already still._

_“It’s dead,” he whispers. “But you will always feel it, my love. Promise.”_

_He hasn’t called him that in years now. Doctor can’t feel his face, tears and fire making it numb, and he presses his forehead to Master’s for the last time._

_“I promise.”_

He kept that one, at least.

 

/

 

Harry comes to him late at night. It’s been a month since they met, and they’re orbiting a quiet uninhabited planet somewhere on the outskirts of the Milky Way. It’s dark in Louis’ room, so at first he doesn’t see Harry’s face, but when the light from the open door hits his frame, Louis shots up in worry.

“What’s wrong?” He stands up from the bed just as Harry comes up to him, his face wet, a book clutched in his hands.

He presses his face into Louis’ neck — a recent habit he picked up out of the blue, but it’s not like any of them is complaining.

“Sirius just died,” he murmurs softly, a deep shuddering sigh shaking his shoulder.

Louis cooes softly and wraps his arms around Harry’s waist. He puts his face to his hair so that he doesn’t have to talk loudly — experience shows that distressed people react better to quiet soft whispers.

“I’m sorry, sun,” he murmurs, gently squeezing Harry. “But he didn’t die in vain, eh?”

Harry sighs again, his wet eyelashes tickling Louis’ skin.

“I was so mad at them for locking him up, you know.”

There’s something in his voice — some serenity, and grief; and it feels like something more than just his love for a fictional character. Louis frowns and pulls back to look into Harry’s face. Harry looks up, a distant look in his eyes, some unknown fire burning in the bright green, illuminated even more so by his recent tears.

“He deserved to be free,” Harry whispers, his lips trembling. “He didn’t do it because he was evil. They were driving him insane.”

Louis swallows, unsure as to what to do. Something in his heart calls out to Harry — to console, to hold, to love. It’s not weird. Somehow, it is not. Getting a crush is never weird — that’s how people are. And even if, no matter how hard and desperately he tries to deny it, it’s something different with Harry — more serious, more fundamental, it still feels natural. Like he was meant to be near this incredible creature, holding his hand as they run away from a burning robot.

There are moments, though, when he simply does not know what to do. Harry looks like he wears his heart on his sleeve, and will spill you all his secrets the second you ask; but he is pretending. Louis isn’t sure if the man realizes it himself, but there’s always such a strong flair of dramatics to his actions that it seems too amusing to be real.

He needs to give Harry justice — he is, indeed, a kind and gentle, funny and adventurous, powerful and incredibly intelligent person; but there is a secret behind his skin. It’s brimming on the edges of his body, so close to overspilling that he feels the need to run to prevent it, and it’s not obvious to anyone but, somehow, Louis. It’s simple, and it’s painful, and it’s the truth Louis cannot stop seeing.

Harry is heartbroken. Has been for a long time. Maybe, he even forgot himself, yet hiding it is alike to a habit, so ingrained in his personality that he never notices it there. But it is so painfully obvious that it hurts him every time he notices the tremble of Harry’s fingers over his rose ring, every second that he spends watching Harry space out and look into the sky, seeing something known only to him, every time he laughs but cuts himself off way too early as if he’s being impolite. Like he’s not used to laughing by himself.

About six hundred and forty years, Harry had said. Louis can’t even imagine it — almost a dozen lifetimes spent in pain.

He touches Harry’s cheekbone and strokes it gently.

“Sirius was innocent, wasn’t he?” He tries to hold the pretense of them talking about the book even if Harry is thinking about someone else. Someone who was torn away from him.

Harry holds his breath, focusing his gaze on Louis’ eyes as if seeing them for the first time. He blinks, and — smiles.

“He was in my eyes,” he whispers, almost hysterically. “And that’s what killed him.”

And then he’s gone, his book pressed close to his chest, his steps quiet in the dark room. He stops by the door but doesn’t turn around, his hand on the wood.

“Every time they’re the same.” He mumbles to himself. Louis kneads his head, afraid to press further. Harry doesn’t need him to — he takes a deep shaking breath and leaves, closing the door softly behind him.

Louis falls back on the bed with a dull thud, a headache starting as soon as his head hits the pillow. He sighs through his nose and presses a hand to his forehead.

He wishes he could take a look inside Harry’s mind. He would, most definitely, get lost in it — and he doesn’t find it in himself to mind.

 

/

 

“Where is your home?” Louis asks him one evening as they’re sitting on the doorstep to TARDIS, their legs dangling in the space. They’re outside the Canis Major constellation, just right of the Adhara, Sirius shining brightly somewhere in the distance. Harry was so impressed by Harry Potter and the habit of the Black family to name their children after the stars that he insisted they take a trip to every single one mentioned in the books.

It’s going smoothly, for the most part, if you don’t count that hostile group of weird ice people they stumbled upon near Andromeda — they somehow set up camp with their old rusty ship, hidden by the starlight from the gazes of the creatures hunting them for their crimes. Well. It’s not like Harry and Louis wanted to interfere too much — but they kidnapped Zayn the Chicken, so something had to be done.

They dealt with it pretty quickly and only lost a few feathers off Zayn’s arse and half of Louis’ eyebrow, plus he almost died from chilblain, but apart from that, everything was peachy. They handed the prisoners to the Shadow Proclamation (dull folks, Louis asked to never meet them again) and off they were.

And now they’re here. Both trying not to think about the conversation they had about not-Sirius. Harry knows Louis isn’t stupid — he understood that his breakdown wasn’t entirely caused by the death of Sirius Black. No. Harry spent the night crying his eyes out, catching his blankets to keep from screaming, because it just happened sometimes — Master came back to his memories and dreams in his full glory, his smile blinding and his eyes bright. And every time, Harry was reminded of every single promise that he broke and the one he kept.

He clears his throat, looking down at their joint hands. It just became natural for them to intertwine their fingers. Harry feels it meaning something, but he’s oh so scared to look at it closely — so he just holds tighter.

“Gone,” he says quietly. He doesn’t want to think about it, but it’s easier talking with Louis than it is with someone else. “Destroyed. I can never go back.”

“Even if you travel in time?” Louis wonders softly. Harry noticed that he does it — takes on this soft, gentle, and soothing form when he’s consoling someone — be it a lost child they met in the biggest library in all the universes on Carsus, or be it Harry, coming to Louis in the middle of the night to talk because the memories would haunt his dreams. It is incredible. It is painful. It helps.

Harry nods, not trusting his voice. He can still hear the screams and smell the fire. He can still see the familiar eyes, the one betraying him, and leaving the planet when it became too hard. The War took everything from him — and he longed only for one man. He wonders for what must be the billionth time how can he be so selfish. Master died because he let him — because he didn’t help the man who had the potential to either save or destroy nations.

“Don’t you think I tried?” He says, looking up at Louis’ face. “I mean...”

He breaks off, taking a deep sigh and closing his eyes. Does he trust Louis enough to tell the story? Does he trust him enough not to turn away after he realizes what kind of man he is traveling beside?

“Hey.” Louis leans closer, his fingers brushing Harry’s cheekbone. “You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to.”

“But I do,” Harry rushes to say, gripping his hands. The light from the Adhara is illuminating the side of his face beautifully, reminding Harry of the contrast — his dark soul against Louis’ blue eyes. He blinks. Oh. “I think it’s easier if I show you.”

He stands up then, taking Louis with him — it’s hard to let go of his hand. They go up to the console, and he takes a deep breath, reveling in the reassuring presence of Louis next to him. Alright.

The familiar coordinates come easily, his hands inputting the number he didn’t dare touch in hundreds of years. It’s easier with Louis by his side, so he looks at him, smiling softly. The boy smiles back and pulls the lever that sends them flying through space.

It takes barely a minute to get there. Harry looks at the door, fearing to look outside because he knows what he will find there. He knows because he did it to them.

“Shall we?” Louis asks quietly from beside him, and Harry nods, breathing shakily.

They take a few careful steps towards the door, Harry working himself up and Louis — burning with curiosity. There is a peculiar look on his face, yet Harry doesn’t ask — he’s currently trying to prevent the memories from suffocating him.

When they open the door, it’s cold. It’s dark. It’s—  

“Nothing.” Louis frowns, straining his eyes to see something in the pitch darkness. “There aren’t even any stars. Are you sure it’s the right place?”

“Yeah,” Harry breathes out, a bitter smile on his lips. “This is my home, Louis. Gallifrey, the home of mighty Time Lords. Turned into nothingness. By me.”

Louis jerks his head to look at Harry in shock, sudden fear in his eyes. Harry feels him trying to take his hand away, and he’s ready to let go — but Louis surprises him. He stops himself, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes.

“Elaborate, maybe, you dramatic idiot,” he grits out, and Harry can’t help it — he laughs.

“There isn’t much to tell.” He bites his lips and shrugs. “There was a… War. The great Time War to end all wars. Time Lords were fighting the race of Daleks — monsters with no heart and armour in place of their skin. Many of great warriors had fallen, and it seemed like every race in the universe was affected. It was horrible.

“And then a man appeared. A Time Lord, the outcast of his own people, driven insane by something that he couldn’t control — and he proposed a solution. He was a traveler, running through the universe, trying to escape the destiny that followed him at every turn. In his travels, he found something to help stop the war, but nobody would listen to him because he made too many mistakes. They put him in prison, and while he was rotting away, the solution to the death at his fingertips — more people died.

“Until someone freed him. Someone who loved him despite the horrific acts of his past. Someone he grew up with, someone who knew him and his heart — and how kind it was, even if he tried to fill up the hole in his soul with death and destruction. He broke down the prison and rescued his lover, desperate to hold him once again after years of separation. Together, they found the device that the man had hidden away, and they were about to activate it, when the truth, the horrific, ugly truth came out — the solution to the War, the way to end it was as simple as it was terrifying. Destroy everything.”

He swallows, suddenly out of breath. He can still remember it all so clearly — Master’s face from behind bars, disbelieving to see him, his Doctor, after years and years, after promises to never meet again, after swearing to stop loving — and there he was, his sonic screwdriver clutched in his hand.

_”Hello, my love.”_

_“I’m not_ — _Don’t call me that.”_

_“You’re still my husband.”_

_“And you’re still insane.”_

And then another memory comes — just two of them across each other, a great battle a few miles east, and they hear its sounds — screeching of metal, screams, and cries, and death. A golden box before them, glinting in the suns, and he’s looking at the face he once loved so much, ( _and still loves — for how he can ever stop_ ) determined and mad.

_”It has to be done, sun. They will wipe out the Universe.”_

_“And you want to do that to them instead?!”_

_“The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”_

_“This is genocide!”_

_“This is salvation.”_

_“You’re mad and cruel.”_

_“And you’re still in love with me. That is why you’re going to let me do it.”_

 

“The device needed a sacrifice,” Harry continues. He chuckles darkly. “Amazing, isn’t it? In order to destroy billions of lives, it needed another one. The man and his lover stood before a choice, and the choice was death.”

He looks into the darkness. There is nothing here now, but he still knows precisely where the Gallifrey once was, and where was a little moon to which they took the device when they broke out of the prison.

“He was mad,” he whispers. “They were even madder. He came back to the place that hated him for what he’d done to help them. And they locked him up, didn’t even try to listen.”

Harry doesn’t see Louis, he doesn’t even see the darkness of the vast space — he sees Master’s face, his eyes burning with fury and determination, and his hands touching Doctor’s neck for the last time.

“I always saw him as impulsive. Delusional. Selfish. But in the end — he sacrificed himself.” He closes his eyes and groans — it hurts so much. “I tried to stop him, but he said something to me — the words that have been following him his entire life.”

_A repeating seesaw game. I’m sick of it. And I’m ending it now._

“I never understood what it meant, but I saw it in his eyes — that he wanted, he needed to do this, and I let him. I let him be taken, I let that bloody thing suck out his soul and take his strength, and I held him in my arms as he was dying to save the universe that did nothing but hurt him his entire life.”

He can’t take it anymore — he falls to his knees, letting go of everything that holds him, and he screams — it feels as if his soul is being ripped apart once again, and he’s losing the love of his life again, and he’s failing him again.

“Harry!” Louis shouts, falling right beside him and clutching his shoulders, giving him his warmth and his strength, and his eyes look just like Master’s — and it hurts even more.

“They’re all gone,” he breathes out, his insides on fire. “And I miss him the most.”

“You loved him,” Louis whispers, and he understands — there is something in his voice and his soul that knows what it is even if he is so young and just a human. “You loved him.”

“I still do.”

They don’t say anything after that. Harry wishes to lose track of times, but his mind still feels all the minutes they spend sitting there, on the doorstep of TARDIS Master stole with him, feeling as they’re both falling apart, only the darkness of the space that once upon a time consumed the great races of Time Lords and Daleks around them.

 

_Master falls to his knees, a painful smile on his lips._

_“You will never forgive me, you know.”_

_Doctor tries to help him up, to make him stand up, to pretend as if everything is alright, and he didn’t just start the countdown to the destruction of everything they know._

_“It is strange,” Master whispers, his bright eyes looking up at the sky on fire. “The Moment tried so hard to stop me, you know? It still worked.”_

_“No, please, no, why do you always have to do something so stupid,” Doctor interrupts, his fingers frantic on Master’s neck. “Stay with me.”_

_“You will meet me again, sun.” Master smiles, his lips pale. “But I will not meet you, I am afraid.”_

_Doctor wailes, hitting his chest, angry at him for giving up._

_“The song,” Master whispers. “Of course.”_

_“I love you.” Doctor is frantic, desperate, hurting_ — _losing the only one he could ever love. “Forever.”_

_“I know.” He looks down, his eyes burning, and for the first time in his life calm. “It worked.”_

 

/

 

“So I was thinking.” Louis falls next to Harry on the couch.

They’re at the coronation of a princess whose name neither of them bothered to remember. They just stopped by to take a swim, Louis liked the views of a planet with seventeen moons, and somebody mistook them for members of the Royal family. So they stayed.

“That can be quite dangerous, if I may say so,” Harry answers, taking a sip of his horrendous drink made of a pink plant with spikes.

“Oi!” Louis slaps his arm and chuckles. “Idiot. Anyway. I was thinking. There must be a place of which you think every time you want to feel happy and calm.”

Harry swallows, his good mood suddenly halting. Ever since their trip to Gallifrey, Louis has been trying to find ways to cheer Harry up. He keeps coming up with ideas that have them crafting, reading, running, dancing, and one memorable occasion — trying to save their arses from an ancient witch, who, for the record, did not appreciate being called a hag. It’s not exactly bad — Harry likes traveling with Louis, and whatever keeps his mind at peace is okay with Harry, but some part of him wishes for the boy to forget the whole thing.

Master is something the Doctor will always carry in his heart. He doesn’t regret sharing his secret with Louis — but he keeps feeling like every time his gaze lingers on Louis’ smile or every time he notices the familiar blue of his eyes, he is betraying the memory of his friend-husband-enemy.

“Louis—” he starts, putting his cup down.

“No, listen.” The boy raises his hands, asking him to keep silent. “I know I can get annoying. But I promise this is the last one. Let’s just go there, you’ll relax. I won’t even complain if something will try to kill us!” His eyes are big and round, and so, so beautiful. “Also, at some point, I would like to address the issue of things always trying to kill us whenever we go. But that’s for another day.”

Harry sighs. Looks at him and thinks — you’re so much alike. He was the same — always running, always getting in trouble, always wishing to be the loudest and the brightest. I had to leave him when his taste for adventures turned into a thirst for blood. I had to leave him because I couldn’t stop him.

“One last time.” He purses his lips. “And then you’ll stop trying to fix me.”

“Ah, but sun.” Louis smiles brightly, gripping Harry’s hand. “You’re not broken.”

He drags him off, then, eager to start their newest trip, and Harry barely has the time to say goodbye — because he is always polite, thank you very much. They run back to TARDIS, because walking isn’t as interesting, and he wonders if Louis minds always staying by his side. He will never ask for it, of course — either answer will be a lie, anyway.

 

_”You promised.” His voice is breaking, his eyes turned away so that Doctor doesn’t see his moist eyes. “To always stay by my side.”_

_“I promised it to a kind boy I loved.” He is desperate for Master to look at him, to gift him with his love, but he cannot allow his heart to falter. “Not to a cruel man who destroys to bring himself joy.”_

_“They don’t matter!” Master yells, his hands flying up to his head to clutch his hair. “Nobody matters but you! I protect you, and I always make sure that you are fine, and this is what you do?”_

_Doctor feels mad, suddenly, angry at himself for not helping Master, for not preventing it, for not being enough._

_“I love you.”_

_“It doesn’t really matter, eh, sun?” Master laughs cruelly but flinches in pain. “This bloody song! If you leave me, it will drive me insane.”_

_Doctor swallows and takes a step back. Letting him go is hard, walking away is even harder. But there is blood on his hands and a crack in his mind, and he cannot just stand there_ — _he needs to leave._

_“You already are, my love.”_

 

_/_

 

“I don’t even know if we can get to it, to be honest.” Harry frowns.

“Why?” Louis is feeding Zayn the Chicken on the floor, and he looks up, his hair fluffy as he picked up a habit to run his hands through it once it became unusually long. They’ve been together for two months already, but it feels like forever.

“It’s really far away in space and time.” Harry racks his brains to remember how he got there the first and only time. “I didn’t even control the ship at the time, it was— It was someone else.”

His face turns grim, and Louis nods, lowering his head to hide his expression from Harry. They both know who Harry is talking about.

“Alright, let’s try it,” he whispers and strokes the console, silently asking his girl to help him. The engines whirl to life, and after a strange second of some kind of a glowing sound off they go. Louis grips the panicking chicken — Zayn really hates when the ship is moving, apparently, and looks in worry at how the console lits up gold. It takes them four minutes to get to the destination, and it’s the longest they’ve ever travelled. Harry swallows when they arrive, going for the door and opening it before he can change his mind.

It’s just like he remembers. Stretched out for miles and miles before them — a beautiful land, green and gold and red plants scattered all over, grey hills visible in the distance. The once he once stood on and was promised the world. He only ever needed one person.

Louis gasps from behind him, and the door softly clicks shut. This planet has two suns, just like Gallifrey, and both of them make Louis’ face illuminated, his eyes burning brightly.

Master regenerated four times yet his eyes always stayed the same.

It is strange.

“It’s so pretty,” Louis whispers, coming up to Harry and taking his hand. “No wonder you feel happy here.”

“I think,” Harry starts, looking at the side of his face and realizing something that makes him want to run and stay glued to his place at the same time. “It’s the company more than the place.”

Louis turns to him, his eyes widened. He blinks and licks his lips, and then looks down like he always does when he’s getting ready to say something important, his long eyelashes casting a shadow on his cheeks.

“Thank you,” he whispers. “For every travel and every world.”

“You are welcome, Louis,” Harry says just as quietly, fascinated by the beauty of Louis’ mind, by the grace of his body, by the kindness of his heart.

“Why did you invite me?” Louis bites his lip, stomping his feet nervously. It is incredibly endearing. “Why did you come to me?”  
Harry thinks about the vision he had — Louis playing with his little sister, a smile that looked so painful on his face, his blue eyes sad and tired, and his hands — familiar as if Harry already knew how it feels to hold them. He remembers his thoughts then, and his promise.

“I just wanted to always see you smile,” he confesses, suddenly nervous.

His emotions have been running rampant ever since he met Louis — and it is incredibly distressing because it was so simple before him! With Master, it was always so immensely easy to feel — love, anger, hate, grief, it was so simple because they were always meant to be each other’s souls, and they fit; yet with Louis, with his incredible strange human Louis, every second feels like he’s turning human himself, with their messy feelings and confusing emotions. But it is as easy as it is hard — because it’s Louis. His Louis.

“You succeeded, I guess,” Louis whispers, smiling, and they’re somehow incredibly close.

He sees the patterns in the colour of his eyes, and he feels the desire to never stop looking, and Louis puts his hands on Harry’s neck, and he’s looking, looking — and he realizes that this whole time he was not _seeing_.

Because as Louis’ lips touch Harry’s, he realizes something, and it makes his mind explode, and his hearts freeze — Master’s eyes were the same every regeneration, and he missed them so much that he didn’t notice a simple truth. He was looking at them for the past few weeks.

It would be so easy to get lost in the kiss — Louis feels right, he feels like he fits there, and Harry thinks — I love you. The thought is new yet familiar because the feeling has been inside of him his entire life.

He doesn’t want to believe it because it is impossible, because he saw Master die, he saw his regenerative cells being consumed by the Moment, he saw them seal the war inside the trap from where there wasn’t an escape; and yet now he is kissing the boy with the same eyes, and was Universe really as cruel as to set up this coincidence and send him to find Louis? He’s learned it. He’s travelled it. He’s fallen in love with it.

And he knows it never allows coincidences.

 

” _You see_?”

Louis breaks away, his mouth gasping for breath, his hands still gripping Harry’s shoulders. Harry blinks, suddenly terrified at the unfamiliar voice that seems to be coming from all around them.

“What was that?” Louis screams out, his gaze flying around looking for the intruder but Harry’s is focused on his face, his mind racing with the revelation.

Did he trick him? Is it an act? Did it take him almost seven centuries to plan this? Was it another one of his games, a charade he loved so much, a final mockery?

“How did you survive?” Harry asks, and he hates his voice for breaking, and his eyes for stinging, and his heart for rejoicing.

Louis looks at him, his lips red, his eyes terrified.

“W-what?” He is gasping for air as if he’s underwater, and he’s hugging himself. Harry wants to reach out, but he _needs to know_. “Harry, I don’t understand what’s happening, I—”

Suddenly, he screams and falls to the ground, his hands gripping his head, his mouth open in a plea for help.

The scenery before them starts to change. Harry looks around, his hand automatically going for his screwdriver, because it is impossible — they are on solid ground, on a real planet, yet everything around them starts to change, colorful plants blackening and rotting, bright sky darkening, grey clouds coming over it, and the sounds — at first it seems like the wind, but then he hears a familiar tone, and the voice, and the words—

 

 _Alright. Let’s not scope out who’s gonna get off first. Let’s not drag things out, however our hearts lead us. Let’s make the ending, whoever will get off this repeating seesaw game. Let’s stop it now_.

 

“No,” he breathes out desperately because he was hoping so much it’s not true, he was pleading to his own mind for it to tell him — he’s mistaken. It can’t be.

Louis screams out again, and Harry hates himself for just standing there — he falls to his knees, and it is such a familiar scene that he falters for a second, desperately trying to keep himself together. He doesn’t know if his theory is right, he isn’t sure of who the person before him really is, but he needs to help. He is the Doctor, and he needs to help.

“Louis, shh—” He leans over the boy to press his lips to his forehead. He’s cold. Harry swallows and kisses his eyelid. “Talk to me. What do you feel?”

Louis whines, his eyes shut, his face constricted with pain, and Harry’s already seen this — and it hurts.

“I feel like I’m dying,” Louis croaks. “And I keep hearing this song.”

“I hear it, too.” Harry frowns, clutching Louis’ hands.

Louis opens his eyes, and Harry freezes. They’re the same blue, yet the irises look as if they’re wired with gold, the lines crossing the color and making it glow. Louis exhales, and a little cloud of golden steam comes out — Harry can’t breathe. No.

Something clicks on the ground, and he looks down to see a round ancient watch, glowing and shaking. His mind is blank, frozen in panic and pain, and he wishes to go back to that moment where all he knew was Louis’ eyes and lips; because the watch looks too familiar, because he knows what it is, because the fob watch that just rolled out of Louis’ pocket is nothing else but the Biodata Module.

He feels like his lungs are in the frozen water, and he cannot take a breath as the pain of betrayal and joy come crushing over him, and his hands are shaking when he picks it up. It can’t be, yet it is — six hundred and forty years later, and  _he_ is here — his essence brimming under the metal of familiar Gallifreyan scripts, warm to the touch.

He looks up at Louis’ face, his vision blurry, and he cannot utter a word, yet he needs to say something, he needs to do something — because the blue eyes are golden now, and he is on the verge of regenerating, and the Doctor is powerless in his pain.

He does the only thing he can — the only thing that seems right. Because for the past centuries he has been dreaming about holding his lover’s hand once again, and wishing to turn back the time and control it, breaking all the laws and paradoxes, and tearing his husband away from the Death’s grip — he opens the watch.

 

/

 

“The Moment is a powerful little shit, let me tell you.”

Master grunts as they carry the box through the halls of the prison, looking around to check if someone is following them.

“Yeah?” Doctor adjusts his grip and sighs. “Sounds like you.”

Master yelps and pokes his tongue out.

“Really?” Doctor scoffs, rolling his eyes. They’re almost at the entrance he blew up when he came here. The guards here are terrible at their jobs, but it is understandable — most of the good ones are fighting in the War. “What are you, eighty?”

He knows the circumstances aren’t the best, but it feels so nice — to banter with him again. It’s been seventy years since they’ve been really together, and he missed it. Ever since Master became uncontrollable and furious and he left him, all they’ve been doing was fighting each other, meeting across galaxies in the least expected places, and swearing to destroy the other, and letting them go in the end. They’re still married, and he still wears his rings. He regrets not taking them off before coming here.

It takes them twenty minutes and fourteen insults to get inside the TARDIS. Once the box is secured, and Doctor starts inputting the coordinates, Master looks around, his hands on his hips, panting.

“You’ve redecorated,” he notes, scrunching his nose. Doctor tries not to look at it — he misses him too much anyway. “It’s horrific.”

He rolls his eyes without turning around, pulling the lever to send them flying. Of course he wouldn’t like it — it was  _their_ TARDIS once, after all, and all the changes just remind them of how it used to be and how it will never be.

Doctor turns around and finds himself trapped under Master’s gaze, the man standing too close, his hands encircling him, and his bloody eyes burning brightly.

“Oops.” He chuckles and licks his lips. “Hi. Won’t you give your hubby a kiss?”

“Cut it off,” Doctor asks, his breathing hitched. He will never learn not to be affected by him. “The entire universe is in danger, and you want to make out?”

Master tilts his head, the crinkles by his eyes a familiar sight.

“What do we have to lose?”

“The world.” Doctor swallows. Master sighs, and it reminds of the simpler times when he didn’t try to mask his feelings under the pretense of not caring. He flinches, and it’s too familiar for Doctor to miss it. “Do you still hear the song?”

“All the time,” he whispers, and he looks so much like the boy Doctor fell in love with that he can’t help it — he leans forward and presses their lips together.

He should’ve expected Master to press closer instead of letting it go at a simple, chaste kiss — and before he knows it, he’s sitting on the console, Master holding him by the waist and kissing him like there’s no tomorrow. There might not be. For them, it always felt like it.

They lend with a soft signal, and Doctor makes himself pull away. He breathes in Master’s smell and sighs.

“Let’s go save the world.”

Master doesn’t move, his eyes closed, his hands still stroking Doctor’s back.

“Yeah, about that,” he whispers and opens his eyes. They’re mad and determined, and so-so blue, and Doctor feels afraid. “I’m sorry, my love, but you will have to sit this one out.”

Before he can do anything, someone hits him on the head, and it’s all dark — the last thing he hears is the soft whisper.

 

When he comes to, he’s lying on the ground, a desert around him. At first he thinks he’s alone, but he hears a voice and looks around.

Master is few feet away from him, and he is talking— to a child.

“This won’t end well,” the child says, her long hair lying on her shoulders like a gown. She’s sitting on a golden box. “You saw it all.”

“Master—” Doctor grunts, standing up.

When Master turns to look at him, he stills. There is something different about him — he looks younger, and calmer, and— not like himself. His eyes are still the same, but they carry something else now, and Doctor reaches out for his hand without thinking about it.

The girl stands up and sighs so heavily as if she is carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.

“Make your decision, mad one,” she sing-songs, but doesn’t take her eyes off Doctor. She disappears into the air.

“It has to take me,” Master tells him, his hands still on his knees. “It has to take me, and then it will devour everything, and they will be locked inside, and nobody else will die.”

He reaches out and puts his hand on Doctor’s neck — and he sees it all. He sees what the Moment will do — take everything away, wipe away the universe, destroy every atom as if it never existed, and it needed a sacrifice.

”It has to be done, sun. They will wipe out the Universe.” He’s frantic, his lips bleeding from him biting them too much.

“And you want to do that to them instead?!” He can’t handle it, he grabs his hands, presses them to his hearts — here, feel it beating and don’t go.

“The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Master smiles bitterly. They’ve had this talk so many times before.

“This is genocide.”

“This is salvation.”

“You’re mad and cruel.”

“And you’re still in love with me. That is why you’re going to let me do it.”

Doctor shakes his head, fire starting in his mind. No. Never.

“No.”

“Yes, sun,” Master says, and before he can do anything, the man he loves presses a great button on the box, and then it’s quiet, even the battle in the distance coming to a halt.

Master falls to his knees, a painful smile on his lips.

“You will never forgive me, you know.”

Doctor tries to help him up, to make him stand up, to pretend as if everything is alright, and he didn’t just start the countdown to the destruction of everything they know.

“It is strange,” Master whispers, his bright eyes looking up at the sky on fire. “The Moment tried so hard to stop me, you know? It still worked.”

“No, please, no, why do you always have to do something so stupid,” Doctor interrupts, his fingers frantic on Master’s neck. “Stay with me.”

“You will meet me again, sun.” Master smiles, his lips pale. “But I will not meet you, I am afraid.”

Doctor wailes, hitting his chest, angry at him for giving up.

“The song,” Master whispers. “Of course.”

“I love you.” Doctor is frantic, desperate, hurting — losing the only one he could ever love. “Forever.”

“I know.” He looks down, his eyes burning, and for the first time in his life calm. “It worked.”

Doctor is gasping for air, unable to look up from where he's pressing his forehead to his husband's chest. No. It can't end like this. The War is not over. They are not over. Master presses something in his hand — a ring. A beautiful rose.

“The last one… Promise me,” Master whispers, his last breaths being torn out of him, his hands gripping Doctor’s palms. “Promise you will never forget me.”

The pain isn’t something he will later be able to describe — it’s not physical, but it feels like every part of his body is on fire. Master puts Doctor’s palm on his chest, where one of his hearts is already still.

“It’s dead,” he whispers. “But you will always feel it, my love. Promise.”

He hasn’t called him that in years now. Doctor can’t feel his face, tears and fire making it numb, and he presses his forehead to Master’s for the last time.

“I promise.”

 

/

 

Harry watches as his younger version is weeping over Master, and he can’t breathe.

Louis is lying by his feet, on the golden sand of the Gallifrey’s moon, and it is clear like it never was before — he is the Master. Once the watch was open, Louis absorbed the Biodata, and the perception filters disappeared — and the eyes that Harry thought were so familiar turned out to be exactly who they reminded him of.

“I thought it would work, you know.”

He turns to his right to see the child he saw once before on the Moment box, and who he now knows as Félicité. She’s glowing. Her eyes are golden, and her hair is wrapped around her small arms.

“I showed him what will happen to you if he does it,” she continues. “How miserable you will be. Because you see, he didn’t care for the destruction of his people — they all betrayed him anyway. But you. You were his everything. And I thought that, surely, seeing how lonely you will become… It will stop him. It didn’t.”

Harry looks at two people on the ground again. In a few minutes, he will make himself let Master go and run away to escape the fate of his people.

“Master loved me,” he says, his voice breaking. “But he would never sacrifice the billions of lives just for me to be happy. He had to do it — he had to activate the Moment to save the innocent people caught up in the War.”

He had years to think over it. He had a lifetime to accept it.

“Huh,” the girl breathes out. “Interesting.”

It feels like an epiphany — to stand here and watch it all happen again when he is older and wiser, and has forgiven. He sits down on the sand to touch Louis’ face. He still doesn’t understand how it works, but he knows how powerful the Moment is — it cost her nothing to place Master in the future to meet his Doctor and travel with him.

“All this time, I was looking at Louis, thinking about how familiar he is, and it was Master all along.” He can’t stop looking at his face. It’s almost transparent because he is nothing but a memory — the real Louis, the one that was a cover for Master, is already dead a few feet away from them. He returned to his body as soon as Harry opened his watch because the Moment’s lesson was over — and yet he learned all the wrong things. Harry smiles. That is exactly the Master he knows.

“It had to be done,” Harry says and stands up. “He had to kill them.”

He feels— Elevated, free. He wishes he could reverse it all and save everyone, but life isn’t as easy, and the Universe had to suffer the loss of these people to carry on. The Great Time War destroyed everything in its path, and one final destruction was necessary to end it. It is done, and he will carry on with his life, knowing that the choice his love made wasn’t one of cruelty — it was an act of kindness.

“Nah.”

He turns to the girl, frowning at such an unceremonious interruption of his philosophical talk with himself.

“Excuse me?” He exclaims, scandalous.

“You people.” She rolls her eyes and clicks her tongue. “Always have to be so dramatic. Why do you think your lover-boy had a damn song looping in his head his entire life?”  
Harry blinks, positively confused. He has completely forgotten about it, and didn’t see how it connected to the small problem of the genocide Master had committed — he just always assumed the song had something to do with what happened to Master when he was but a child in the orphanage.

The girl rolls her eyes again and snaps her fingers. Harry sees a vision before him — to the day after their first travel, the song boosting through the speakers, Louis dancing around with a happy smile on his face. And then another vision — a small boy, his eyes blue as the sky, playing with a glowing timebox that emits the same song, and suddenly it opens, the light coming into his eyes and making him cry, grasping at his head.

“He was hearing the song he himself played in the future,” Harry whispers. “But— who sent it to him?”

“You, you dumbass.”

Harry turns to the girl again, a scandalous look on his face.

“Will you at least try to be serious?!” He exclaims. “I’m trying to understand why my soulmate was hearing this absolutely random song that has been hurting him the entire time, and what do I have to do with it, and how it’s supposed to be relevant to you—” Oh. _Oh_.”

The girl smiles proudly.

“Finally.”

He doesn’t listen to her, turning around and opening the door to TARDIS, running inside and turning on every sound system on the ship. He runs to one of the closets, rummaging through the piles of things, looking for something so important to him know that his hands are shaking, and finally, finally — here it is, and he runs out, opening the timebox and recording the song.

When it’s done, he runs back out and presses his lips to the box.

 _Do you really think you can get away from me so easily? Come back to me, my love_.

And away it goes, flying through time and space, and looking for a little boy, carrying its message all across the galaxies and years, and as soon as it is off into the vortex, the disappearing image of Louis gasps, becoming solid, breathing, _real_. Harry looks up — Doctor and Master from the past are gone, and the world is frozen, awaiting its fate, and the Moment is sitting on her box, smiling smugly.

“Are you alright?” Harry falls to his knees once again, grasping Master’s hands.

He groans and blinks a few times as if he’s recovering from hearing something loud and annoying. “I _just_ got your message, love.”

Harry can’t help it — he laughs in relief.

“What happened?” Master asks, his bright blue eyes just the same, and so _alive_.

“You messed up,” Doctor blurts out and leans forward. “But I’m not leaving you alone this time.”

They’re silent, looking at each other, and he begs the sky to make Master, Louis, his soulmate to understand.

“I sent you the song that drove you insane, my love,” he whispers. “But the last part of my message got lost somewhere, and I never—”

Louis interrupts him — moves forward and presses his lips to Harry’s, and this time it feels right, it feels like it was meant to be because it was.

“You’re here now,” he whispers when they pull apart, and his eyes are burning, and Harry missed it oh so much.

“Alright, folks, I got places to be,” the Moment calls out but then chuckles. “Okay, I don’t, actually, but still.”

She is suddenly before them — lying down on the sand, her hand supporting her head.

“Just to get you up to speed — I turned everything around, and now you have a choice to save everyone. It won’t be so simple, of course, but I’m gonna help you contain them.”

Louis frowns, his hand gripping Harry’s. It feels right.

“But I know what you are.” He takes a deep breath. “You destroy worlds.”

“Check your lore, pretty one.” She tilts her head and winks. “I stop wars. The ways to do that are various, and the one who activates me decides what to do. Your heart was mad when you first came to me — and the only thing I could do was to devour everyone.”

Harry stands up, looking around. It is so still and peaceful that he wishes for it never to change. For the blood to never spill again, for the tears to never be cried, for voices to never scream. For it to forever be so calm.

“I know what we need to do. Put it in stasis. Make it stop. Press pause,” he whispers. “But I do not know if it’s a good solution.”

“It is.” She yawns. “It will give you time and opportunity to fix everything that needs to be fixed.”

Louis looks at him strangely, and Harry notices something — he is not just Master now. He remembers his life as Louis, and he’s learned from it, and his eyes aren’t haunted anymore.

“Why did you tell us to run at that Disneyland planet?” He asks, overcome by a sudden urge to know, to _make sure_.

Louis swallows and looks down, kneading his hands and taking a shaking breath. He comes closer and takes Harry’s hands, and kisses his rose ring.

“Because I felt that a giant bloody Mickey Mouse isn’t worth dying over,” he deadpans, a smile tugging at his lips.

Yes. It is still his Master.

Because there is a memory — from a thousand years ago, from when they first stole their ship and set the random coordinates, and went away without looking back, and promised to each other — to never look back and always survive.

“Guys, are we doing something, or should I call you a marriage counselor?” The girl sighs loudly, exasperated.

“She’s annoying,” Louis notes. “Reminds me of someone.”

“Yeah.” It feels too easy — but it is what it is. “I missed you too.”

 

Once upon a time, Doctor fell in love. It wasn’t sudden, and it wasn’t a surprise — his heart always belonged to the only person who could handle it.

Once upon a time, Doctor broke a promise. It hurt him, even if it was the right thing to do. He turned away from the man who thought the world his playground. And well — Doctor got sick of the seesaw.

Once upon a time, Master broke his heart. As years went by, they grew up, but they forgot that they were not children anymore. Master couldn’t hold entire worlds in his palms just because it seemed fun, and Doctor couldn’t hold Master’s mind together just by kissing his skin.

Once upon a time, Doctor walked away. Master had become angry and uncontrollable, and he defied the laws of time and space to — to have fun. Doctor couldn’t understand it, then, and he thought it madness.

Once upon a time, they hurt each other.

And now — they are trying to save the universe.

 

“Remind me when this is done…” Harry sighs and takes Louis’ hand. “We need to talk.”

He doesn’t see the look on Louis’ face, but Master smiles softly, his burning mind calming down for the first time in his life, the song quieting down, the fever letting go.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, looking at the Time Lord beside him and seeing the boy he fell in love with. “We really do.”

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on [twitter ](https://twitter.com/romulusadhara)  
> 


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